Towering surf from Hurricane Lowell demolished seawalls and oceanfront homes on Kauaʻi’s south shore, with one witness saying five or six homes were destroyed on one street in Poʻipū.
“I've never seen anything like it in my life. And the fact that some of these houses are still intact, but they're shifted 20- [to] 30-feet in a direction is pretty wild,” said part-time resident and recreational surfer Vincent Maguire.
Maguire saw the wrecked homes in his neighborhood fronting Baby Beach. Before the storm, about 15 feet of sand and a two-to-three foot high seawall were all that separated them from the ocean.
Houses to the right and left of stairs descending to the sand from Hoona Road were mangled. Swells dragged the house to the left of the stairs into the roadway and obliterated the house to the right.
“The foundation is still there and some of the structure. But for the most part, the house looks like a 20-foot wave blew the side of it out all over the street,” Maguire said.
Nearby houses were missing walls, windows and porches. Waves lifted cars and deposited them in neighbors’ garages. Along with the five or six homes that were destroyed, Maguire said another dozen homes in the area were severely damaged.
A group of four people had been vacationing in the house that ended up in the road. They evacuated Monday night.
“They felt the whole home shake and quickly realized that it'd begun to destabilize and they needed to get out,” Maguire said. He spoke to them after they returned Tuesday morning to see what was left.
National Weather Service meteorologist Patrick Blood said the center of the storm passed about 60 miles southwest of Poʻipū. Blood didn’t have surf measurements for the area, but said it was measured at 25 feet at Barbers Point on Oʻahu. From that, he extrapolated that Poʻipū surf reached at least 25 feet and possibly up to 35 feet.
Maguire’s home is four-to-five houses inland and was not affected. His parents built it in 1986, and he’s been visiting since he was born. These days he travels to Kauaʻi two-to-three times a year from his San Diego home for a few weeks at a time.
“We had our neighbors stop by and ask if we needed any food, water or beverages to help us get through the next few days,” Maguire said. “The community here really is amazing, and everybody's stepping up and supporting one another.”
